It’s not that hard to delegate. The real issue is trust.

You don’t completely trust yourself because you think it’ll take too long to explain it. You might not remember everything. You’ve tried it before and it backfired.

You don’t completely trust other people because they’ve let you down in the past. You think it’s a reflection on you when it’s not done right. Their mistake is proof that you have to do it yourself.

You’ll never be able to grow your business by doing everything yourself. You know this, which is why you have a team in the first place.

But they’re only doing a fraction of what they could be doing because you’re not delegating enough.

The more you delegate, the more you can spend time doing what you love, leveraging your strengths, and growing your business.

You know what the CEO of a $50M/$100M business does?

1. Create the vision
2. Decide the priorities
3. Allocate resources
4. Evaluate results
5. Hire & coach leaders
6. Model the culture

If you’re like most business owners, you’re great at the first 1, good at the 2nd one and ok at the 3rd one.

But when it comes to evaluating results, things fall apart.

Sure, you notice when something isn’t done right and you may get frustrated and point out the issue. But that’s not what evaluating results means.

Evaluating results is how you increase trust. Instead of blindly hoping they’ll do it right and instead of doing it yourself, you explain the results you want and afterwards you assess the outcome.

Every result is just data until you have a thought about it. A “negative” outcome is just as valuable because it highlights what not to do.

Don’t make it mean something’s gone wrong if you don’t initially get the outcome you want from delegating. Manage your mind and choose to believe all results provide valuable data.

This 4 step process takes the emotion out of evaluating results:

1. WWW: What Went Well
2. WDW: What Didn’t Work
3. WDD: What Do Differently
4. WDWL: What Did We Learn

The time you save by delegating is worth the time you spend evaluating.

For example, say you delegate proposals and estimates, and save yourself 20 hours, but then spend 15 hours evaluating results and iterating what the next actions should be.

This is great news! You’re not just 5 hours ahead, you’ve started a reusable process, which becomes part of your company’s IP.

The process of consistently evaluating results is the substitute for blind trust. You delegate with confidence because you know you’ll assess the outcome.

It’s part of how you grow yourself as a leader and free yourself to focus on strategy instead of execution.

It’s how you grow your business, your team, and yourself at the same time.